The Honeymoon Suite I: Bedroom at La Colombe d’Or

by delacybrown on July 2, 2015

I knew that staying at La Colombe d’Or would inspire me. It wasn’t just that it happens to be stationed in one of the most exquisite locations in all of the French Riviera, but it has also inspired countless of the world’s most famous modern artists, and I wasn’t going to be the exception. So armed with my handy box of gouache paints, brushes and using the Colombe d’Or’s ashtray for water (sorry Colombe!) I set about painting what most inspired me. And from the very first morning, when I awoke to find light flooding into our bedroom, the rays dancing and undulating as they reflected across from the swimming pool right outside the room, I knew what I would have to paint.

The work which resulted is this one, the first in my Honeymoon Suite series. The painting depicts not only the effect of the light entering through a quaint wooden window into our pastel-coloured room, but also the proximity of the Alexander Calder mobile, and the Braque mosaic, just outside our room, which never failed to excite me. In the foreground is the little desk which I used to paint this very same painting, breathing the cypress-perfumed air which wafted through the window as I did so.